Mom Finds Out Baby She's Carrying Has Fatal Diagnosis Halfway Through Pregnancy: 'Most Beautiful, Painful Experience' (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Madysen Wilcox and family.Photo:Brooke Wilcox

Brooke Wilcox

Madysen Wilcox, 29, was just six weeks pregnant when she began having complications, including bleeding and spotting that her doctors initially suspected may be a sign of miscarriage.

While it can be threatening to pregnancy depending on the location and size of the hematoma, doctors said Wilcox’s “was small and in a spot that wasn’t concerning.” So they recommended pelvic rest, telling her to pause exercising and refrain from staying on her feet for long periods of time, or lifting anything heavier than 10 pounds.

“I did that for two weeks and my hematoma resolved and everything seemed fine,” Wilcox says.

Once she entered her second trimester, the spotting began again.

Madysen Wilcox.Brooke Wilcox

The condition, she learned, is fatal.

“The outcomes that doctors [gave] us are very grim,” Wilcox says, noting that she saw four separate doctors after receiving the diagnosis. While each physician offered a somewhat different answer when asked about exact life expectancy, they all offered the same outlook: Charlie would not live long, and had a high likelihood of not even making it to birth.

Madysen Wilcox and her husband.Brooke Wilcox

However, Wilcox and Charlie defied some of the odds. “Most babies with this condition end in a miscarriage before the second trimester,” she says. “Those who survive the first trimester, do not live past 24 weeks gestation.”

But at 34 weeks pregnant, Charlie’s heartbeat remained strong.

As she explains to PEOPLE, Wilcox was told that only one out of 10,000 pregnancies with Alobar Holoprosencephaly make it to a live birth, but she remained optimistic, sharing details of the condition, and her pregnancy, onTikTok.

She also made an effort to speak about Charlie as much as she could throughout her pregnancy, both with her husband and their two other children.

Madysen Wilcox and family.Brooke Wilcox

As the couple got closer to delivery day, they met with their doctors to plan how best to handle Charlie’s arrival, making “plans for every possible scenario,” Wilcox says.

While Wilcox’s due date was Oct. 27, doctors had planned to induce her on Oct. 4, just one day shy of a full-term pregnancy.

But on Oct. 4, the hospital was too full to accommodate her inducement — and she gave birth on Oct. 5 as she had hoped.

Ahead of his due date, Wilcox’s plan was to “cherish the little time we get with our son, just getting to know him and holding him in our arms, where he is warm and knows he is loved,” she shares.

In the end, they got to do just that. In a video posted toTikTok, Wilcox explained that Charlie “made his debut on the morning of October 5, 2024. We spent 41 beautiful minutes with him until he peacefully passed in our arms. Charlie’s life was brief but perfect … he only knew love and the warmth of his parents' arms.”

Never miss a story — sign up forPEOPLE’s free daily newsletterto stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

For Wilcox, the moments she spent with Charlie were life-changing.

source: people.com